Threnody
by RZZMG
Summary: Hermione Granger is obsessed with finding out the secrets of a mysterious music box found at Grimmauld Place, where she's been assigned to stay with fellow Order members Draco Malfoy & Blaise Zabini - two men she's equally in lust & in love with. What's the music box's secret & how will it change everything for her, Draco, and Blaise? Romance/Dark Drama. 2013 HP-3SOMES Fest entry.
1. Chapter 1

**AUTHOR'S NOTES:**

**This was my 2013 HP-3Somes Fest (hp-3somes . livejournal . com) entry. The fest is over and reveals are out, so now I can post this for you here. This fanfic is multi-chaptered, but is already finished. I will post a chapter up every week until it's done. Here was the prompt I worked from:**

_Prompt: Draco x Hermione x Blaise, __Non-con sex, Consensual sex, Explicit profanity, Bondage, Hair pulling, Spanking, Forced nudity, D/s (dominant men), A/U, Mindfuck, Unique Plot_

**Thank you to my last minute beta, L! Thank you to "darkly-exotic" for the inspiration for Blaise's character in this fic. Thank you to the Mods for putting on this fest. Fairy (scarletladyy), it was a great pleasure writing this for you (I was excited to get your assignment!), and I hope you enjoy your story!**

* * *

**DISCLAIMER: **"Harry Potter" is the property of J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros. This fanfiction was written entirely for fun, not for profit, and no copyright infringement is intended.

**TIMELINE:** Post-Hogwarts, A/U (story begins October, 2004 – Hermione is 25, Blaise is 25, and Draco is 24).

**MAIN CHARACTERS FEATURED (alphabetical order, last name):** Hermione Granger, Draco Malfoy, Blaise Zabini

**SECONDARY CHARACTERS FEATURED (alphabetical order, last name):** Regulus Black, Kreacher, Remus Lupin, Harry Potter, Severus Snape, Ginny Weasley, Molly Weasley

**SUMMARY:** Hermione is obsessed with finding out the secrets of a mysterious music box found at Grimmauld Place...

**RATING: **NC-17 (MA)

**WARNINGS:** Sexual situations - Non-con (explicit) and Consensual Sex (implicit), Explicit profanity, Bondage, Hair pulling, Spanking, Forced nudity, D/s (dominant men), A/U, Mindfuck, Plot,

**Notes:** This fic is compliant up to the "Half-Blood Prince" novel - the "Deathly Hallows" novel is completely tossed out, except for this: _Secrets of the Darkest Art_ is a canon book from the "Deathly Hallows" novel. The Enchanted Music Box is an actual item from novel canon ("Order of the Phoenix", Chapter 6) & Ginny did have a brief encounter with it in the book. Refer to JKR's Black Family tree diagram for relationships, if you get confused. Threnody = a song, hymn or poem of mourning composed or performed as a memorial to a dead person.

* * *

_**THRENODY**_

**By: RZZMG**

* * *

Despite a number of misplaced bets by her friends on the matter, it was insatiable curiosity, not martial courage, that Hermione Granger felt was her most serious vulnerability.

Like Macbeth's hubris and Atalanta's vanity and Crookshanks' overwhelming need to chew on the ends of her feathered quills, she was plagued by an uncontrollable vice that was as much an integral part of her psychological make-up as her compassion or her sense of fair play. Inquisitiveness was her one doom, a curse hefted upon her by virtue of the nature of her parents' nurturing, and she'd always secretly worried that her need to _know_ might one day get her into the type of trouble that no amount of cleverly-stored knowledge could hope to reverse.

That moment finally came the instant she'd noticed the lovely, silver music box sitting up on a curio cabinet's shelf in the living room at Number 12 Grimmauld Place was no longer warded against opening.

The antique box, slightly tarnished by age, was inlaid with the loveliest of blue sapphires. Birds were carved onto its lid, some in flight with wings spread, others landed and preening. Around the sides of the box, two long vines twined around and around, meeting at last in the front as budding flowers that pressed together in resemblance of a kiss. Hermione thought it a rather romantic design, actually.

The box seemed perfectly harmless upon first glance, but Hermione remembered a particular summer afternoon between her fourth and fifth years when she and her friends were cleaning up the ancestral house of Black to make it liveable, and the box had been opened. She'd been on the second floor, cleaning up the bedrooms with Mrs. Weasley, and so hadn't heard the strange, sinister tune Ginny had later described after her friend had innocently turned the crank and lifted the lid. It seemed the area effect of the song had been an instant spell, though, causing those on the first floor to feel wool-headed and sleepy. Thankfully, Ginny had slammed the lid shut once she'd realised its powerful sway over everyone in the vicinity, thus nullifying the box's magic and averting a potential disaster. The box had been returned to its shelf and a blue ribbon hit with a very powerful Sticking Charm wrapped around it to prevent its opening.

Of course, Hermione's curiosity had been piqued by that story, but there had been more important things to consider and to do than to investigate a charmed music box after that, and so she'd put the entire incident from her mind...

...until the ribbon that had kept the box closed had strangely disappeared just yesterday, with none of the three who lived in the house the wiser as to how such a thing might have happened.

Worse, when she'd contacted McGonagall about it via Floo-call, the elder witch didn't seem the least bit interested in correcting the problem right away, the war and trying to run a school in the meantime consuming her every action and thought.

Of course, that lack of precaution bothered Hermione. It was like a hangnail in her brain. That her most trusted and respected mentor seemed uninterested in rectifying the situation, and more importantly, that such a potentially dangerous box had not yet been removed from the house, had Hermione questioning just how terrible and dark a thing it might be. After all, wouldn't Molly, Arthur, or one of the other older Order members have confiscated the trinket if it had posed such a serious threat to the assigned residents and frequent visitors of the house? Or, at the very least, wouldn't that despicable Mundungus Fletcher have made off with it to sell after Sirius' death, as the vile man had done with many other such items in the house?

Why wasn't anyone interested in the box but her?

She looked at it now across the room from where she currently sat on the sofa in the living room, her fingers itching to find out if the box was still wound from the time Ginny had turned the crank. If it was, she could simply lift the lid and...

"Don't even think about it," Blaise warned from his lazy recline on the sun bench before the tall front windows that overlooked the street. He didn't glance up from his reading of _Secrets of the Darkest Art_, but Hermione knew he was quite aware of where her attention had shifted. "Leave it be, _amante_."

"It should be studied, though," she argued once more. "I mean, if it were truly an object of evil, wouldn't you think Moody or McGonagall would have removed it by now?" She made an exasperated gesture with her hand. "Why leave something potentially dangerous out in the open like that? And I still want to know who removed the ribbon Sirius had put on it. Tell me again it wasn't you."

Blaise chuckled, and the sound was rich and naughty coming from between those full, enticing lips of his. "It wasn't me, Granger. And perhaps the reason no one but you seems as obsessed with the thing is because: a. there's a war on which takes priority, and b. McGonagall and Moody expected some of us to have solid common sense and know not to randomly go about stirring up hornets nests."

"You poke around all the time without a care," she automatically countered, meaning his rather bad habit of going through her school trunk under the excuse of wanting to borrow from her rummaged book collection.

Blaise, of course, took her words to mean something entirely different. The man made it his life's habit to read sexual innuendo into everything she'd said, blaming the Latin half of his heritage for such deviance. And oh, did he love to tease her!

"Not all the time. I only do the 'poking thing' when the random, available female decides to drop in to check on us and relieve the tedium."

Hermione rolled her eyes and dryly muttered, "Oh, yes, you're a real ladies' man, Blaise - a true Cassanova."

Rather than feel shot-down by her sarcasm, Blaise's astoundingly huge ego accepted her words as a compliment. A heated smirk rose slowly up his cheek, tripping the same reaction in her that Draco's always did.

"Yes, I am, aren't I," he stated without an inch of modesty. "'Always leave a woman satisfied.' That's my life's motto."

She snorted in a rather unladylike fashion, used to this sort of banter from him after living seven months under the same roof as the man. "You know, I've always wondered: is that smug grin taught to all first-years in Slytherin? Because, honestly, that same expression is all-too common coming from members of your former House, and it's simply too effective not to be well-practiced."

His grin widened, showing off his straight, white teeth with startling clarity, and Hermione's blood quite unexpectedly quickened through her veins. Merlin, what a turn-on it was to see such lovely dental work - and all natural at that!

Trying to get her heart beat back under some control, as the thing was fluttering around under her ribs like it might fly away at any minute, she turned her head to the side, covered her mouth with her hand, and pretended to cough.

God, how was it he could always do this to her? From day one, since his defection to the Order's cause had been announced, she'd been prepared to dislike Blaise Zabini. And yet, three and a half years after his unexpected change of loyalty, when he'd first come to live here at Grimmauld, and they'd finally met again for the first time since the end of her sixth year at school, Hermione had found herself unable to stick to that resolve. Blaise's boundless charisma and playful wit made it difficult for her to stay angry with him for long, and he was intelligent enough to aid her in her research efforts, which was attractive to the scholar within her soul. He could make her laugh as no one else could, and he could make her want in a way she hadn't since she and Ron had broken off their attempt at romance years earlier. The sexual chemistry between her and Blaise was hot enough to burn through her core.

And in that respect, he was as dangerous to her as Draco was, for she felt the pull to the Italian wizard just as much as she did to Ferret Boy.

Ironically, both men were as equally tempting to her as that bloody music box, and yet neither man was a safe bet for her sanity. Blaise was a well-known philanderer, having made his way through most of the single witches in their class back in fifth and sixth years, and those in the Order since his desertion from Voldemort's ranks. And Draco... he was a tortured soul, who had only recently begun to smile and laugh, but there was still a lot of darkness in him. She'd heard him sometimes when he'd be sleeping crying out from whatever terrors haunted his dreams.

Why, oh, why couldn't she be attracted to morally upstanding, mentally stable wizards, like Charlie, or Neville, or Seamus, or hell, even Harry? What was wrong with her that she had this odd fascination for dangerous things?

Blaise abruptly closed his book and set it aside, and her attention was instantly drawn back to him. He turned on the bench, planting his feet on the floor, and faced her square-on. "Would you really like to know what they taught us way down in the secret nooks in the Hogwarts dungeon, Hermione? I'd be more than happy to enlighten you on the subject, if you're interested. I promise you'd consider the experience quite educational."

As was frequently the case whenever they were alone, the space between them suddenly became charged with sexual energy. He wickedly licked his bottom lip in a manner that drew her eye right where he wanted her to look – at his mouth.

Forget her heart trying to escape through her chest; it was currently crawling up her throat and attempting to escape past her teeth!

"Pouring it on a little thick, aren't you, Blaise?" Draco drawled with amusement as he sauntered into the room from the hallway as casual as a raven taking a stroll along the walls of the White Tower. He was dressed in his traditional all-black ensemble with the first two buttons of his collar rakishly undone, his longish, platinum bangs flopping across one eye... and smirking like the Devil, himself. "You know Granger's not one to be easily swayed, especially by a silver-tongued serpent like you." He took a seat at the piano bench nearby and leaned back to rest his elbows on the closed piano lid behind him. "She's got more class than that."

With the sudden appearance of their housemate, the moment between Hermione and Blaise abruptly broke apart, giving her a moment's respite to get her breathing back under control.

Blaise turned to his friend. "Hermione happens to like my tongue, you jealous git." He cushioned the insult with a cheeky jog of his dark eyebrows and a light-hearted tone.

Draco's grin fell quite abruptly and he barked a derisive laugh. For the first time since he'd come to Grimmauld Place, Hermione was surprised to hear no playfulness behind the sound. In fact, if she didn't know better, she'd say Draco sounded downright spiteful and mean, much as he had back in their school days.

"Is that why it's constantly flagging to your knees and flapping in the wind whenever she's around?"

Hermione's cheeks went fire-engine red and as hot as the sun at that.

"FYI: you might want to invest in a winding spool," Draco relentless continued, "so you don't accidentally trip and fall on that hunk of useless meat one day... because that would just be terribly tragic."

"Draco, stop," she growled, shocked by his words and his ill-behaviour. "What's gotten into you?"

In seven months, Draco hadn't once spoken to either her or Blaise in such a manner, despite the fact she'd expected him to treat her rather poorly from the very beginning. Harry had warned her that both men had changed since their defection from the Dark Lord's service, and it hadn't taken long after he'd moved into the house for her to see that fact, but right now, it seemed as if Draco had reverted. Shades of the cruel, young man he'd once been were showing, and Hermione didn't like that fact one bit.

Something was off. She had no idea what had caused Draco to be in such a bad mood, but she wasn't going to tolerate him picking fights.

Not to her surprise, Blaise didn't reply to his friend's taunting. Of the two, he was clearly the more mature. However, when he moved to his feet with a grim expression and hard eyes, clearly intending on not giving Draco's ridicule a free pass, Hermione felt worry gnaw away at the delicate lining of her stomach.

Blaise was close to six-four if he was an inch, and his muscles had filled in with age, putting him around seventeen and a quarter stone. His thighs were like tree trunks, and his shoulders were broad and powerful. He worked out every morning for two hours before breakfast and at least an hour or two more during the day, performing hundreds of sit-ups, push-ups, and using a magically conjured bar for pull-ups. He used hand weights that he'd brought with him in a charmed bag, and even skipped rope, shaking the whole house with the _thump-thump_ of his feet hitting the floor over and over again. As a result, he was stacked with strength, physically fit, and quite intimidating.

Draco rose in riposte, meeting his friend's challenge head-on. He was a few inches shorter and at least three stone less than his friend, but he was no slouch when it came to the body maintenance thing, either. The exercise regime Blaise favoured was also Draco's daily training routine; the two had developed it together when they'd been lower-ranked members of Voldemort's Death Eater army, knowing that success on the battlefield wasn't just about magical strength and thinking fast on your feet, but also about physical speed and might, too. Draco had been equally as diligent in the care of his body as Blaise, so she knew he could certainly hold his own in a fight.

Good Lord, the two were going to get into it right here, weren't they? Holy Merlin, there was going to be a clash of the titans right here in the Black ancestral living room, and Hermione knew of no way to stop it except to use magic on the two – something strictly against Order code. You _never_ turned your magic on a fellow Phoenix member except to save his or her life – those were the rules.

Well, this situation would certainly qualify, right?

She stood up as well, squaring her shoulders. She may have been only five-four, but what she lacked in physical power, she knew she more than made up for in magical strength. Her wand slipped into her hand from her side holster and she tapped it against the outer muscle of her thigh to get their attention as she stepped between the two wizards.

"Enough posturing, both of you," she warned, stepping equidistant between the two. She let her head turn from one to the other. "If I have to _Petrify_ anyone, I'll put the body in the cellar with the rest of the vegetables and leave it there until Christmas."

There was a breathless moment in there where Hermione wasn't sure her companions were even listening to her, but then Blaise relaxed his fighting stance, conceding to her demand.

"As you wish, _amante_."

"Don't call her that!" Draco snarled, bringing the tension right back into the room. "She's not your lover!" He glanced down at her, uncertainty crossing his sharp, patrician features for the first time. "You're not, are you?"

Hermione couldn't have been more shocked than if someone had told her Snape had turned spy because he'd secretly loved Harry's dad and wanted revenge for his death. Numbly, she shook her head and turned to Blaise. "No, I'm not. And you said it was an endearment of friendship."

Blaise's dark, high cheekbones suffused with blood. "It is. You usually _are_ friends with-"

He didn't finish, looking away.

She turned back to Draco. "How long have you known what that word meant?"

He looked at her like she was daft. "I spent summers at Blaise's villa growing-up. Our parents were friends."

"So, in other words, you speak Italian and you've always known what he was saying when he started calling me that," she guessed.

Draco shrugged. "I figured you understood. You usually know everything."

She frowned at that. "I do not know _everything_. And anyway, why is it an issue now? If you'd thought he and I were intimate, and I was permissive of the nickname since month two of you both moving in, then why is him calling me that now –five months later- an issue?"

Draco stepped towards her, and from her peripheral vision, she watched Blaise go stiff and wary again. Hermione didn't budge, however, refusing to be intimidated by Draco. She hadn't been when they were children, and just because he'd sprouted up over the years didn't mean she would be now.

"You're not sleeping with him."

It wasn't even a question.

Hermione's ego took the hit, but she tweaked an eyebrow at him in irritation. "And what if I were?"

Draco actually growled. Loudly.

Jaw dropping to her feet, her disbelief hit the roof. Was he really jealous, as Blaise had intimated earlier? No, that was... it was...

It was not as impossible as she would have imagined, actually.

Seven months earlier, when he'd first come to Grimmauld a week after Blaise, the change in Draco had left her dumbfounded. He'd grown from the sullen, malicious boy who had always craved the spotlight into a contemplative, stoic man of few words. She'd known the moment they'd locked eyes when he'd walked through the front door that fateful day this past March that he'd done unspeakable things in the course of this war that he'd regretted and was seeking atonement. Intuitively, she'd understood that that was why he'd switched sides years earlier, and also why he'd agreed to take on the assignment to guard Grimmauld Place for Harry (freeing up her best friend and Ron to go off hunting down all rumours regarding horcruxes).

That revelation is what had melted the defensive barrier she'd erected and fortified in advance of his coming to the house. After that, it hadn't taken them but a couple of weeks to feel comfortable in each others' presence, and he'd been the first to reach out an olive branch, offering her an apology for the unkindness he'd shown her in the past.

They'd fallen into a good rhythm then, with him helping her in researching horcruxes along with Blaise, all while the three of them guarded Grimmauld Place, the Order's most important, central safe house – and he and Blaise protected _her_, as she could no longer go out into the field, thanks to contracting Lyme disease while camping out in the wild with Harry and Ron during that first year of the war.

As a result, their friendship had blossomed to the point that Draco now felt comfortable teasing and pulling pranks on her. He'd swap her research books out with hardcover erotic fiction, push her off the piano bench here in the living room and take over at the keys (with a proficiency that awed her), and he never failed to comment on the horrific state of her "wild, Amazon hair" at every opportunity. She'd retaliate by tossing her red clothing into the wash with his whites, by eating every piece of chocolate in the house (he had a sweet tooth to rival Willy Wonka's), and by purposefully running the hot water in the kitchen whenever he was in the shower.

They'd developed a relationship that worked as a result, and hadn't deviated from that routine for the last several months...

No, wait, that wasn't entirely true, was it? Just this month, he'd cornered her in the kitchen, coming up behind her and caging her between his arms at the sink while he'd bent his mouth to her ear and asked her simple questions about what they'd plan to do for lunch and dinner. With his hot breath tickling her throat and his low, honeyed voice summoning her desire, her hands had trembled over the cup she'd been rinsing out.

That had been the first time she'd felt the unthinkable for Draco Malfoy, even though she'd believed he was just playing with her.

By then, however, she'd already decided she'd lusted after Blaise, too.

Torn between her growing feelings for both men, she'd gone out of her way since 'the kitchen incident' to rationalise the situation, and had decided it to be inadvisable to explore either option. She'd set her mind on other things to distract it - like the fact that that blasted music box no longer had a ribbon tying it off and warning her away.

"Why would it matter, Draco, if I was seeing Blaise in that manner?" she asked again, terrified of the truth, but needing to hear it aloud.

He stared at her with barely controlled fury, his cheeks as red as hers, his eyes as dark as storm clouds. His fists were clenched at his side, and his chest rose and fell with rapidly sawing breaths. "You know why," he stated in a tight, hard voice. Then, moving slowly, he uncurled a fist and reached up to stroke the tips of his fingers across her cheek. The anger melted from him the moment their flesh met, and he took a shuddering breath. Looking down at her from his greater height, he whispered again, "You know why."

"Fuck, no!" Blaise thundered, and Hermione jumped, pulling away from Draco's touch.

When she turned around, she was surprised by the expression upon Blaise's face: he was seething with jealousy. And he had his wand in his hand.

"You bastard! You know how I feel about her, and you're doing this just to spite me - and you're trying to confuse her at the same time! I won't let you."

Hermione's heart slowed the moment he raised his wand arm and pointed it at his friend.

"Blaise, drop your wand." She spoke calmly, but firmly. "We can talk about this."

Blaise rubbed at his temple with his free hand and shook his head. His arm shook.

Something was very wrong here. The aggression level in the room had just shot up by metres again, over an issue that seemed as though it could be reasoned through if they'd just all stop to do so. But how could she possibly diffuse the situation when it seemed that she was unwittingly the cause of the schism between the friends?

Opening her mouth, unrehearsed words tumbled from her lips in an effort to soothe Blaise's temper, trying to convince him to lower his wand all the while. Yet, even as she tried to reason with Blaise, Draco slyly stepped to his right and backwards until his shoulders touched the curio cabinet that lined the entire east wall.

Blaise kept his wand trained on Draco... which put Hermione completely out of the line of his fire.

"Blaise, listen to me-" she pleaded as his eyes narrowed and his arm went straight and true.

Oh, God, he was going to cast an Unforgivable, she just knew it!

Unfortunately, Draco couldn't seem to keep his mouth shut in the face of certain death. "You just want to add her to your collection, Blaise. That's all she is to you: a conquest. Just like every other person you've ever had."

Blaise snarled. "You're wrong! I love her!"

Draco laughed with contempt. "You don't know how to love, only how to fuck."

That, it seemed, was the wrong thing to say.

_"Crucio!"_

_"Protego!"_ Hermione screamed, casting her spell at Draco right as Blaise's took flight.

Draco dodged both, jumping to his right and rolling behind one of the couches. Blaise's spell struck Hermione's shield and bounced at an odd angle...

... right into the curio cabinet, shattering the glass and knocking over the items inside.

Before any other spells could be cast, an eerie, bell-like tinkling filled the air, and all three of them simply stopped what they were doing to listen. It was a compulsion that could not be denied.

Hermione knew even before her eyes were drawn to the shelf where the strange music was originating what she would see.

The silver music box had been blown onto its side and it had opened. Ginny's previous winding of the mechanism had never been discharged, as Hermione had suspected, and the small, metal stop holding back the ratchet lever from turning had been waiting all this time for someone to release it by opening the lid. Now, the sinister lullaby warbled through the air, casting its enchantment as its revolving cylinder with its precisely placed metal pins stroked over the lamellae of its steel comb.

A strange voice whispered in Hermione's ear then, urging her to come closer. Unable to resist, she stumbled over to the cabinet, drawn to the magical device, the effects already taking hold of her. She reached out for the box, desperate to see inside. She had to know the answers to all of her burning questions, while there was time and opportunity! Was the box what she suspected it might be?

"Hermione, no!" Blaise screamed at her.

Too late, her curious fingers had caressed the antique metal lid, moving of their own volition, and consciousness was stolen from her. The sweet, creepy sound of tinkling bells followed her down, down, down into the deep, incalculable darkness.

_**TO BE CONTINUED...**_

* * *

**Author's Notes:**

**Please review!**


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Notes:**

**Here's the darkest part of the story, dearest readers! This chapter contains non-con, as warned in the first chapter's beginning notes (this was one of my recipients requirements, and it works with the over-arcing plot). The reason for the italics, the tense change, and the drastic character personality changes will become clear as you continue to read the story. Please hang in there for the big reveal as to why this has happened to come soon!**

**The story unfolds...**

* * *

_"I get her first."_

_With effort, Hermione pries her eyelids apart and tries to focus on the speaker. It takes a second or two for the mop of messy, champagne-coloured hair attached to the rather blurry man before her becomes familiar enough for her to piece together the identity of the wizard._

_It's Draco. _

_As his handsome, aristocratic features become more and more distinct, she is given confirmation of that guess. There is only one man in the world with eyes that remind her of an arctic sky at full noon, and whose strong, beautiful hands have, in secret, made her wonder as to their potential for gentleness in their touch._

_"Fine, but I get her mouth."_

_Full consciousness returns slowly, and she feels dim-witted and slow even when colours bloom before her eyes and angles take shape, but she definitely recognizes Blaise as the other party in the room with them. His deep baritone is distinctive, with a cultured, rich timbre that conjures images of amber-coloured cognac and dimly-lit rooms filled with sweet-smelling smoke._

_"What's going on?" she mumbles, her words garbled by her still-dazed state._

_The two men appear to ignore her entirely, their negotiations holding their full attention._

_Draco smirks. "I'm going to come in her cunt."_

_"I get to come down her throat."_

_"Fine. Agreed."_

_There is a hard yank to her shoulders and ankles then as she feels magic flow over her, and her wrists and feet are pried apart against her will. _

_What's happening?_

_When she is spread open in an obscene spread-eagle formation, she feels hands on the bare skin of her hip and for the first time, Hermione realises that she is naked. A quick glance downward confirms that suspicion. It also confirms that she is slightly off the ground, being held in place by some sort of spell._

_With a firm push against the nape of her neck by Blaise, she is tipped forward until she is bent in half at the waist. Something rubs through the seam at the apex of her thighs; it feels like a finger, and it is not gentle in the least._

_"She's bone dry," Blaise states the obvious. "I can fix that, though."_

_More magic glides over her skin and through her bones, finding a home in her womb. To her utter humiliation, her body is suddenly clenching with arousal, achy and within seconds, she is beginning to perspire from sexual need. "Oh... God..." She moans as the finger returns to its previous investigations, slicking through the now-drenched folds of her pussy. When two of them thrust up into her channel, she cries out from the pleasure._

_Draco is suddenly in her face, gripping her bangs in a tight hold and pulling her so their noses are even. He stares her dead in the eye and gives her a mocking smirk filled with triumph. _

_"Blaise and I worked it out, and now I finally get to have you, Granger. What do you say about that?"_

_Shaking from head to toe as Blaise continues to plunge his hand in and out of her desperate cunt, Hermione can only whimper, alternating between shaking her head and nodding it. It feels good, and it feels horrible, and she is lost in the sensations, unable to think, only to feel._

_Draco drops his mouth to try to kiss her, but suddenly Blaise is there with his free hand pressed over her mouth. "Nuh-uh. I get her mouth first. When you're ready to give up her pussy, we'll switch. Her kiss is mine until then."_

_"Fucker," Draco growls, but steps away. _

_He saunters around behind her, and Blaise's warm hand slips from between her thighs, moving off. _

_Two cool hands take its place, gripping her hips in a tight hold and steadying her. She feels the probe of something stiff and quite insistent at the entrance of her vagina, aligning itself for penetration. Hermione coos with pleasure as it presses in just a little before backing off, and then replays the action again and again, building up her anticipation._

_"Like that, do you?" Draco taunts, pushing the head of his cock in and stilling. He rocks against her very gently back and forth, entering her by increments, and torturing her in the doing. _

_"Yes," Hermione hisses, captive to whatever spell he'd cast upon her to amplify her desire._

_A hand comes down hard on her arse and she cries out at the painful sting to her flesh. _

_"Too bad. I'm not in the mood to indulge a rotten slag like you," Draco taunts. "Maybe if you hadn't been such an incredibly dick tease for months I might be a little more generous, but now you can forget it. This is all about what I want."_

_He rears his pelvis back, hovering at the small opening of her channel, and then with power, he drives his hips forwards, slamming his full length into her with one mighty shove. Hermione screams at being stretched wide open... and nearly faints from the pain when he stills to cast an Engorgio upon his sex while deep inside her. The spell swells him until he's too big, too long. _

_It hurts!_

_When he is ready to move, Draco does so with relentless determination and skill. She adjusts, as her body is meant to do, and soon, the pain begins to evolve into a strange form of pleasure. He fucks into her hard, deep, and takes her to the edge within minutes... but then he changes the angle ever so slightly, avoiding the sensitive spot inside that is guaranteed to bring her, assuring she won't come. Hermione nearly cries from frustration, and as he sadistically laughs as she begins begging for him to let her orgasm._

_For what seems forever, Draco utterly dominates her, taking her with strong, complete strokes at a pace that is nearing brutal. Now her pleas turn to screams as the pleasure returns to pain. "Please let it end. Please pull out. Please stop hurting me."_

_How could she have ever loved and trusted him, she wonders? How had she been so utterly wrong about his intentions and feelings for her? The truth is hard for her to accept: Draco has never changed. He is a Death Eater, one of the wizarding elite, a pureblood supremist, and she... she is just a sickly, unattractive girl with a weak immune system, hailing from common Muggle stock, and unable to protect herself. She is an anomaly of nature that never should have been. She is a tease, fickle, and manipulative when it comes to men. She deserves this. She truly deserves to be punished like this._

_She cries louder and harder at these horrible revelations._

_"Do something with that mouth of hers already, Blaise," Draco finally commands, slapping her buttocks again in a series of vicious smacks that smart her flesh. "She makes too much bloody noise."_

_As if he'd been waiting for such a cue, Blaise steps before her and reaches for the button and zip of his trousers. He takes them down and steps out of them. Fully erect, his dark, heavily veined cock is as thick as her wrist, and as long as her forearm. The crown is a knob of damp, light cocoa flesh, and the twin weights hanging below are tight and engorged. He strokes over that massive length once, twice, and then brings it to her lips._

_"Open up, lover. Suck me," he bids with a nasty sneer, emphasising the endearment with a disdainful tone. "And if you dare to bite, I'll rip your nipples off, so behave."_

_Being pounded from behind forces her panting mouth to open... and Blaise takes advantage, slipping right in, going to the back of her throat on the first thrust. Hermione gags, but he is already pulling out and shoving forward again before she can catch a breath. With one hand, he grips a hunk of her hair and pulls her forward, while with the other he cups her cheek to assure the right angle. He then sets a pace that is unconcerned for her comfort or pleasure, much as Draco's rhythm._

_"Good girl," he murmurs, slapping her cheek rather hard. "Take me deeper. Deeper. Hold there until I say you can breathe."_

_Within minutes, he is practically down her throat with each surge forward, and Hermione is crying from the pain of her oesophagus being damaged, and the continual fear of suffocation. Behind her, Draco has slowed his pace to match Blaise's, and they are like two pistons moving in perfect synchronicity, flowing in and out of her swollen, slick body without resistance and in harmony. _

_Her body is on fire from the damage she's taking, and her heart is utterly broken... and all Hermione can do is wish for death as the torment that these two men heap upon her –men she'd been falling in love with, she now admits– seems endless. _

_"This is fucking amazing!" Draco sighs with contentment, his hold on her hips bruising. "Yeah, take that pounding cock. You like that, Mudblood? Yeah, you like it. You're a whore and this is all you're good for – a hole to fuck."_

_"Hell, I'm going to come," Blaise tells them both, his breath sawing from his lungs, stroking into her faster. "Oh, fucking hell!" He tugs on her hair, pulling her mouth up, and angles the head of his cock at the seam of her lips, gripping it in the palm of his hand to keep it still. She is forced by the angle and the pain in her jaw to part her lips... just in time for his hot semen to splash across the roof of her mouth and onto her tongue. She chokes on it, spitting it out, and it dribbles down her chin. Much more of it, however, ends up down her throat and she forces herself to swallow it, afraid that if she coughs it back up, Blaise will do something terrible to her._

_"Shit," she hears Draco mutter. His thighs and abdomen tighten up against her back, and she knows he is about to go over the edge, too. "I'm coming, too. Oh, shit!" _

_He pumps into her and gasps loudly, and Hermione knows he is ejaculating deep into her unprotected pussy with each thrust. He spanks her hard again, and her throbbing, red skin feels scalded, like a bad carpet burn. Hermione cries in pain... and in relief. It is finally over._

_Blaise lets go of his hold on her hair, and her head slumps forward, pulled by gravity. She spits more of his come from her mouth, watching as it splashes against the waxed wood flooring below._

_To her consternation, the two men switch places. _

_Draco pulls her head up by the hair this time, and gives her a smirk worthy of his father's heritage. "Now, now, slag... we're not quite done yet. We have seven months worth of sexual frustration to work off." He pries her lips apart with his fingers and shoves his cock into her mouth. "Get busy."_

_Behind her, Blaise's fingers are smearing Draco's release all up and down the crack of her backside, and then his finger is tunnelling into the small, virgin rosette of her arse._

_Hermione squeezes her eyes shut and anticipates the pain still yet to come._

_Is this Hell? It must be. But what did she ever do to end up here? _

_Wait, where is here? The last thing she remembers is being in the living room in Grimmauld Place..._

_Softly, in the background, growing louder, she hears the familiar, tinny song from a music box being played over and over again._

_'I know that sound', she thinks, memory returning abruptly, slamming into her cerebral cortex with all the power of a freight train, turning this reality completely on its ear. 'I… remember now. I know why all of this is happening.' _

_She lifts her head to the sky, and shouts at the top of her lungs, "This isn't real! None of this is really happening! This is all an elaborate make-believe!" Her throat burns, and her tears nearly choke her. "I know what you are, and what you're trying to do, and I'm telling you it won't work! Do you hear me? I KNOW AND IT WON'T WORK! I'll never blame them for this, because it isn't really them – it's all you, you evil, half-blood bastard!"_

_Abruptly, the music stops. _

_A blinding, white light shines through her shut lids, and she is instantly teleported… out._

**XXX~~~XXX~~~XXX**

This time, regaining full consciousness is less painful, but more a struggle for Hermione. It's like running through waist-high water.

"-told you we needed to examine it a bit more. I knew it wasn't safe. For goodness sake, it burned my daughter's fingers that time!"

The voice was so familiar. Was that Molly?

"It shouldn't have mattered. Sirius' charm _should_ have kept her out."

Lupin. Hermione would know that gravelly voice anywhere.

"But it didn't, and now look what's happened!" Molly insisted, clearly upset. "It needs to be taken from here and put away where it won't hurt anyone else! I won't have it hurt anyone else, Remus!"

Hermione tried to open her eyes to see, and her mouth to speak, but neither body part would respond. Curiously, it felt as if she were petrified by a spell of some sort, except she could wiggle her toes and fingers when she concentrated.

"She's coming 'round!"

Harry.

Her best friend was here! She hadn't seen him in over seven months and could have cried with relief that he was here now, when she needed his warm, sure strength to tell her everything would be all right.

"Hermione, can you hear me?" he asked.

Slowly, painfully she dipped her chin in a small nod. It was the best she could do given whatever was restraining her at the moment.

"You're safe. They brought in Madam Pomfrey in secret. She has you under some sort of charm to prevent you from moving too much. You've been injured, but you're healing."

His solid, calloused palm stroked over her head, soothing her.

"Just relax and sleep, Hermione," Molly encouraged, her soft, small hands patting one of Hermione's own in a comforting, maternal gesture. "Let the potions do their work, dear. By tomorrow, you'll be fine."

"I'll stay with you," Harry promised her. "Ron and Ginny, too. We're all going to watch over you, so sleep, okay?"

She wanted to ask where Draco and Blaise were. She wanted to warn them not to touch the music box now that she'd figure out its secret. She wanted to tell her friends how much she'd missed them… In the end, though, she let the darkness take her back into its arms, and she slept until her mental and physical wounds healed.

_**TO BE CONTINUED...**_

* * *

**Author's Notes:**

**That was painful to get through, I know, but that was the only dark part in the story, and the reason for it will all make sense in the next chapter. Just hang in there!**

**Please review!**


	3. Chapter 3

The next afternoon, the bandages were removed from Hermione's eyes, from around her jaw, and from her hands. She'd learned the full extent of her injuries then.

She'd had her lids nearly seared off, but thankfully, the skin had been grown back with some potions Severus had secreted to them overnight. Madam Pomfrey explained that she'd been lucky she'd had her eyes closed when the music box's spell had been cut off or her eyes would have been lost, for there had been a curse placed upon the box should anyone fully ensnared by its spell attempt to get free.

In addition, her hands has suffered serious burns, she'd almost bitten her tongue clean through, and her body had been riddled with hand-shaped and fingertip-shaped bruises that no one seemed able to explain. They had decorated her hips, thighs, arms, wrists, around her mouth, and her ankles, but were now completely gone thanks to the Medi-witch's Bruise-Away home brew. Not a trace of that ugly yellow-purpling that haloed damaged skin showed upon her.

Her vocal chords, though, were going to require a bit more time -as well as some truly awful tasting potions- to heal. They'd been damaged badly, but by what, Madam Pomfrey didn't know.

Hermione knew. She remembered every awful moment while she'd been trapped inside the music box's nightmarish realm. Determined to warn her friends of the danger they were still in, she curled her aching fingers into the pantomime of writing, to indicate she wanted to scribble down her thoughts. There was some discussion at the door, as the healer asked someone just outside to bring in parchment, ink, and quill.

A minute or so later, Harry, Ron, and Ginny arrived with the supplies she'd asked. Ron made impromptu use of her medical clip board for a solid surface for her parchment to be set upon, and then she was helped to dip the quill into the ink bottle by Ginny, and she began to print.

_Music box = Voldemort's horcrux_

She glanced up at Harry. He was holding his breath, staring at her words like he couldn't believe it.

_Bring it here. I'll show you._

Immediately, everyone began shaking their heads. "No," was the unanimous response.

_Let me prove it. Bring it here._

Again, one black and two red caps shook back and forth, denying her request. She snapped her teeth together with frustration.

Although it pained her to write, as every joint in her body was sore, especially her hands, she bent over the parchment again, and bore down hard, giving her words emphasis.

_If I have to get out of this bed, someone will hurt. Bring me the box, Harry. _ _NOW__._

There was some discussion from her friends, and each of them glanced over at her, concern in their set expressions, especially Ginny.

When Harry and Ron went out to do as she bade, however, her best girlfriend stayed behind. Ginny slumped over to the seat at her side and dropped her gaze to her hands in her lap.

"A horcrux - like Riddle's diary. Damn, I didn't put it together. I'm so sorry, Hermione. I swear, I thought it was just a cursed box. There were so many dark magical items around here when we first came to clean Grimmauld years ago, remember?" She paused, squirming in her seat, cheeks and nose so crimson that her freckles could be easily counted. "So... you saw _him_, too, didn't you? Tom. He was in there with you, wasn't he?"

Readjusting the quill between achy, throbbing fingers, Hermione scrawled her reply.

_Didn't see __him__, but I'm sure it was him pretending to be other people in my... hallucination? Fugue state? Dream? Whatever it was. _

Ginny's whole body shook, like some sort of shell-shocked accident survivor. "It was a nightmare for me. I've always believed that's why the box sings a lullaby to put you to sleep. It's meant to trap you in your worst nightmare. I saw Tom when I touched the box that one time years ago. Who did you see?"

Dipping the tip of the quill into the ink pot was a slow, painful process, but Hermione managed it. She scratched out more thoughts onto the parchment.

_Draco and Blaise. But not them - their evil doppelgangers. It was awful. But, I thought you shut the box's lid before anything happened to you back then._

A tear slipped down Ginny's cheek and she hastily rubbed it away with the heel of her palm. "I never told anyone, but I fell asleep for a minute, maybe two after I opened the lid. Harry, Sirius, Fred and George were all down the hall, cleaning different rooms, so they weren't affected as strongly as I was by the music. And no one above or below this level heard the box at all, so I took the brunt of its magic. It wasn't long enough of an exposure to fully capture me, though, not like it did you, but… it was enough."

Her cinnamon-coloured eyes flooded with tears as her gaze went far, far away into the land of memory. "Tom was there, looking just as I remembered him from the time I finally met him in the Chamber of Secrets. He was so handsome, but you could feel the evil all over him. He was n-naked. I was, too. He said such horrible things to me about... he was talking about raping me. When I stood up to him, he slapped me hard across the face. I fell from the blow." She rubbed at her cheek, as if she could still feel the sting of that hit. "I don't know how it's possible, but the slap was real. It jarred me backwards. I fell over the piano bench and hit the floor hard. That woke me up." She shuddered and whispered in horror, "If that hadn't happened, I know I would have been trapped in a nightmare of him taking me over and over again, because that's been my greatest fear since I was eleven."

Tired, emotionally drained, Hermione could only nod once in sympathy. The awful memory of Draco and Blaise fighting, and then speaking to her as they had, hurting her, raping her… truly, it was her worst nightmare come to life. Thank Godric she was logical enough and had enough years worth of practice to divorce dreams and nightmares from reality; she doubted very much the experience under the horcrux's magic would affect how she related to Draco and Blaise in the waking world.

At least, she hoped that would be the case, but as she hadn't yet seen them in person...

"I thought I'd imagined the whole thing, you know, until I felt the pain in my fingertips," Ginny said, drawing her back to her friend's story. "Escaping the box had burned me somehow. I ran right away and told my mum. She'd never heard of such dark magic before, and demanded of Sirius that he remove the box from the house. Then, she healed my fingertips and the bruise on my cheek, and that was the last I'd seen or heard of the thing until today. Truthfully, I haven't gone into the living room again anytime I visit this place – not once. I've avoided it on purpose."

Hermione forced the quill tip back to her parchment to reply, mourning the temporary loss of her voice.

_I've read that a horcrux leaks evil that affects people in different ways. Herpo the Foul, the spell's creator, was said to have used a Basilisk for his horcrux, and the spell drove the beast mad. They had to slay it. It made me doubt myself – hate myself, even. At least it didn't do that to you. You stood up to Tom. Good for you!_

It had affected Hermione's two housemates in such a way, however. She recalled the way Blaise had rubbed his forehead as he'd pointed his wand at them, like he was fighting against a compulsion and it was causing him pain. And Draco had reverted back into the bully he'd once been. The horcrux had provoked their anger and jealousy to the point of violence, hoping their fighting would knock it over and free its magic, as had ended up being the case.

It had negatively influenced her as well, edging her curiosity to up into ravenous heights, all to get her to touch it. And then, once inside its spell, it had made her feel as if the punishment she was experiencing was deserved. It had twisted her self-confidence, and made her feel worthless. It had tried to crush her spirit.

It had failed. Hermione wasn't a conceited person by nature, but she knew in her heart that she was a worthy, good witch. She refused to let that foul object destroy her sense of self-worth. She would not let it make her afraid.

The more she considered it, the more she could make the correlation that the music box was as insidious as the One Ring in Tolkein's famous story, and just like that ruinous object, the box needed to be destroyed before anyone else fell under its power. Maybe she could convince Minerva to let her take it for a long walk… all the way up to Iceland, to the nearest active volcano. That plan had worked well-enough for Frodo and company, so why not give it a try.

Her best friends barged back into her small bedroom before she and Ginny could finish their discussion, so Hermione let the conversation lapse for now. However, she was determined to pick it up again at some later point, as the more they knew about horcruxes, the better, and perhaps her best girlfriend could shed some light on that case.

Harry was leading the way as a small group of people came into her room along with him and Ron. He was gloved in a pair of Molly's oven mitts and carrying the silver music box like it was a precious cargo, dangerous and to be handled with care. Behind them came Minerva, Molly, and to her surprise, Severus.

Placing her parchment (turned over for privacy), ink bottle, and quill on the small side table next to her bed, she reached out for the box. Harry seemed reluctant to hand it over to her, however.

"Hermione, I'm not sure you should touch it again. Just tell me what you want and I'll do it for you."

Despite the tiny flinch she'd mentally felt when he'd walked into the room with the antique, Hermione gave him the 'Raised Eyebrow of Doom', and coupled it with the 'Frown of Great Displeasure', knowing how effective that single look tended to be when dealing with the men in her life.

Harry's larynx bobbed as he swallowed with nervousness, recognising the expression from their long acquaintance.

Ron leaned into his friend's side. "Mate, she's giving you 'The Look'. I'd just give the box to her before she hexes your bollocks inside out," he wisely advised. Then he stepped back, just in case. Sometimes, Hermione was amazed with just how truly astute Ronald could be when he wanted to be.

"Right," Harry acquiesced and held the box out for Hermione to take. "Be careful, though."

As soon as the box touched her bared fingertips, she felt its recognition of her. A strange, almost excited energy flared up her arms and an awful, whispering voice began cajoling her to open the lid.

"Wow, that's... Do you hear that?" Harry asked.

She nodded.

"Hear what?" Ron asked. "I don't hear anything."

The others in the room answered similarly.

Harry's narrow-eyed gaze was transfixed with suspicion upon the box. "I think... Hermione might be right."

"I think so, too," Ginny quickly agreed, too much white showing in her eyes.

Hermione tuned out the nefarious whispers as she traced over the birds on the cover of the box. They were ravens. How obvious a thing to have missed! Even the sapphire inlay around the box had been an obvious hint as to the intended recipient of this beautiful piece, for only one of Hogwarts' Founders had loved the colour blue. The box itself –made of silver– clearly represented the interest of its creator, whose appreciation for silver was only outmatched by his preference for green.

She flipped the box over, assuring the lid was secure when she did so. There, carved into the bottom of the box, was proof of her theory.

_**~ A lullaby for my sweet Rowena. Dream of me. ~**_

_**Love, SS**_

Well, that certainly cinched the rumour that Salazar Slytherin had been in love with Rowena Ravenclaw, didn't it? The jury was still out as to whether her fatal illness was brought on by something he'd done to get revenge upon her for shunning him, though, as there was no credible evidence to back that accusation.

Still, it definitely made sense now why the Dark Lord had used this item for a horcrux. He seemed to have a thing for special antiques – his own diary, Marvolo Gaunt's ring, Salazar's locket...

With great care, she turned the music box around so Harry could read the inscription. His brow furrowed at first, and then his expression changed. Enlighten understanding opened his eyes and made his mouth drop.

Harry swore loudly, a shaky hand pushing back his messy, dark bangs. His scar appeared a vibrant pink against his pale forehead, and it was as striking a contrast as his brilliant, white smile framed by his reddening cheeks. "It _is _a horcrux!" He laughed with joy, completely unfettered. "You did it, Hermione! You found the fourth one!"

Ron came up beside him again and read the inscription on the box, too. "SS?"

"Salazar Slytherin," Harry explained. "This is obviously a gift to Rowena Ravenclaw." He gripped Ron's arm with excitement. "Don't you see? The locket was a relic of Salazar's, too. It's a pattern, isn't it?"

"But how on earth did such a thing find its way here?" Minerva asked as she stepped closer, her gaze fixated on the box.

"Walburga, most likely," Remus postulated from the doorway. "She had a fondness for collecting anything magical that was also musical. The more unique and rare the instrument, the more she coveted it. I recall Sirius complaining that she absolutely refused to allow him to play in the music room where she displayed her collection."

"The music room?" Harry asked. He looked around. "Where's that?"

Remus nodded back over his shoulder. "The one with the big piano in the middle. I believe you're calling it the 'living room' now, though."

Minerva seemed downright agitated as she wrung her hands over and over again. "If such a priceless thing was here the whole time, then how did You-Know-Who make it into a... well, one of _those _things?"

"The Dark Lord requires a gift be given in exchange for the Mark," Severus finally spoke up.

"Regulus," Remus hissed, snapping his fingers. "It makes perfect sense. He'd worshipped the Dark Lord from a very young age, collecting news articles and hanging them on his bedroom walls. He'd always fancied himself becoming Voldemort's adopted son someday."

Ron snorted and crossed his arms over his broad chest. "Yeah, I've slept in the little blighter's room ever since the first time we came here and I remember his dedication wall. Downright disgusting, it was. The bloke was bloody obsessed!" He dropped his arms and leaned into Harry again, as if imparting a secret. "Didn't hold a candle to the Cannons shrine I put up over most of it, though." He nodded with all seriousness.

"Regulus must have discovered the music box's uniqueness and decided it would make a proper gift to the Dark Lord," Severus postulated.

Remus shook his head. "More than likely it was his mother's offering on his behalf. The woman made no bones about her support for Voldemort's ideals, and she was well-acquainted with her son's fascination with the Dark Lord's cause by the time he was seventeen. I'm sure Walburga gladly would have, and most likely did, trade such a precious part of her collection away to earn the bragging rights that Regulus gave her by being the youngest indoctrinated Death Eater."

"And he, what, gave it back to them afterwards, having turned it into a horcrux by then?" Harry asked. "Why?"

Remus tilted his head. "I suspect for the same reason he asked Regulus if he could use Kreacher to test out his defences of the locket horcrux when he first sealed it up in that cave you and Dumbledore visited: because Voldemort trusted the Black family would always faithfully serve his needs. Bellatrix, her father Cygnus, his sister Walburga, their father Pollux, their aunt Casseopia, Pollux's cousins Arcturus and Lycoris and Regulus the first – all had pledged themselves to the man's cause in one fashion or another. The Dark Lord probably assumed that Walburga and her son would assure the horcrux would be well-hidden, especially among her vast collection. It would blend in and seem to be just another trinket. As it turned out, though, Regulus betrayed his Master in the end, and his mother... well, she always had been a very vain and attention-seeking woman. Even if she never pointed out the music box to anyone else as it sat on her shelf in the music room, _she'd_ know it was there – prominently displaying her family's importance to the darkest wizard in history. It would be just like her to do such a thing."

"You don't think Sirius knew what it was, do you?" Harry asked in a very soft, contemplative voice. "Like, maybe he wanted me to find it and that's why he never took it away after Ginny's first encounter with it year ago."

Remus seemed to consider that question carefully before answering. "No, Harry, I don't think Sirius would have left such a thing for you to handle, if he'd known what it was. He would have tried to find a way to destroy the horcrux. He would never have put you in harm's way. He probably thought the music box, like most of his mother's things, was something to be dealt with eventually."

Harry pushed his glasses up and rubbed at his eyes, as if tired. "Only his 'eventually' never came."

No one said anything to that.

"So, what do we do now?" Ron asked. "We don't have Gryffindor's sword anymore. That buggering Griphook took it years ago. Probably buried it in some vault by now. No getting it back."

Harry reached out and took the music box from Hermione's hands, treating it with extreme caution. He looked over at Severus, and there seemed to be some sort of silent communication between them, but Hermione couldn't interpret their expressions. Finally, Harry nodded. "We find a safe place to hide the thing until we can figure out a way to destroy it. And in the meantime, we go back to trying to ferret out information on the remaining horcruxes." He turned to look at Hermione, and asked, "You still have that beaded bag you made?"

She nodded, thinking his was a wonderful idea. The Undetectable Extensions Charm on her bag would allow them to place the horcrux into a null-space that would remain untouched by weather and time, as the charm contained a stasis effect. No magic could penetrate it from the outside either, only from the open lip of the bag. She'd made the outside fabric fire-proof and tear-proof with some simple charms as well. You could literally toss the bag about, dunk it in water, douse it in kerosene and light a match upon it, stab at it, and step on it, and the bag and its contents would remain entirely undamaged. And since the bag was kept here with her at Grimmauld Place, which was being guarded at all times by Order members, this really was the safest place to keep such a thing as important as the horcrux until a way could be found to smash it to bits.

Tired, but catching her second wind, Hermione reached for her parchment, ink, and quill and began scribbling away instructions regarding the location and handling of the bag, and her thoughts on keeping it here in the house where she, Draco, and Blaise seemed permanently stationed.

Draco and Blaise. Just thinking about them made her heart ache, but she put the feeling aside for now, knowing that confrontation was still to come, and concentrated on helping in any way she could towards the war effort.

_**TO BE CONTINUED...**_

* * *

**Author's Notes:**

**Please review! Did you see that twist coming? What do you think will happen next?**

**Did you catch the "Lord of the Rings" homage in this chapter? :)**


	4. Chapter 4

Blaise approached her first, two days later.

He found her in the living room staring at the repaired curio cabinet. Its shelves were now empty; the few remaining items that had resided there for so many years had been removed by Molly, Arthur, and Remus for cataloguing, post-war. She was surprised to learn the blue ribbon Sirius had charmed to keep the music box sealed had not been found lying around on some shelf, having somehow come loose and slipped off. It was, in fact, nowhere to be found.

Until Blaise came into the living room holding it out to her.

"Where did you get that?" she asked. They were the first words she'd spoken to him since their fight days earlier.

He held up the book he'd been reading when he'd been sitting on the window seat, reading that same afternoon. "It was between pages, marking a spot about horcruxes."

She turned the soft, silken ribbon over and over in her hands, wide-eyed and a bit panicked. "But how? I didn't put it there."

He considered that for a few second before answering. "Neither did I."

"I believe you," she told him, glancing up into his dark eyes.

Blaise stared down at her with a hint of wariness and a pound of frustration. "Just like that - no need for proof. You trust me that easily and that much, especially after what happened?" She nodded and he seemed confused by her easy response. "Why? You certainly have no reason to. Draco was right: I've manipulated you from the start, intending on having you fall under my charms."

Hermione considered the wisdom of her next set of questions before opening her mouth. "To what end, though? Am I only a conquest to you, as he accused?"

She waited for his answer, her heart in her throat.

Slowly, he reached up and brushed a wayward strand of hair from her cheek. When she didn't flinch away, he moved into her private space, closing the gap between their bodies with a smooth step.

"I thought of you like that at first, yes," he admitted. "The idea of seducing a formidable witch like you was a challenge I couldn't resist. But somewhere along the line..." He let his gaze roam over her features, even as his fingers did likewise. Each touch brought tendrils of electricity writhing up her spine. "I began to see you, Hermione – the real woman underneath. In the months since I arrived here, I've seen your strength. You soldier through that awful potions regime and battle against the constant pain of this lingering disease you're still fighting off, and I can't help but respect you for it."

His hands ran up and down her waist and around to the sway of her hind, pulling her even closer, and the differences in their heights and builds were instantly magnified. Hermione could feel his erection pressing against her stomach, and she had to tilt her head far back to look him in the eye. It was a bit awkward, but strangely, a part of her liked how he engulfed her in his arms.

"I've seen your unreserved kindness in the thoughtful, little things you do around here to make living in this dingy, old house not quite so bad," he continued, murmuring his praise against her cheek as he dragged his nose down and followed the curve of her jaw. "You know, Draco still brags on and on about the birthday cake you made him this past June." He pressed a small, barely-there kiss to her temple. "And I've seen your gentle compassion for that wretched house-elf that lives here. You always protect him from any abuse, even from your friends and fellow Order members. He's an outsider, but you treat him like he matters."

"He does matter," she muttered the automatic response. "Every life matters."

Blaise's mouth twitched with a smile she could feel, rather than see. "And that, _amante_, is why I feel for you as I do."

Their lips were inches apart when she panicked and let the truth pop out of her mouth.

"I want you both – you and Draco!"

Blaise paused, and as he inched back, his lids flared in surprise.

"You do?"

Swallowing her fear, Hermione nodded. "I'm sorry, but I do. And... I can't choose." She stepped back, extricating his hands from her person, she put a wide space between them. "That's why I can't let this happen - because there'll be no going back, and I'll regret it, knowing that I can only give you half my heart."

She continued backing up, and Blaise watched her go with a peculiar smile on his face.

Wasn't he hearing her?

"It sounds selfish and... a bit peculiar, I know, but I love you both," she babbled on, "and I know it's an impossible situation, but I can't help how I feel. I can't lie about it either. So, it really would be better for none of us go there. That way, we're all safe."

She took one last step backwards... and bumped right into a warm, hard body standing in the living room doorway.

"Safe, but not content," Draco murmured from directly behind her, dropping his head so his lips hovered right over her ear, just as they had the night he'd come upon her in the kitchen. "Sounds boring to me."

Hermione tried to jump away, but Draco was quicker. His arms shot around her, pulling her to him so her back was tight to his chest.

"And here I thought Gryffindors were supposed to be bold," he teased. He nipped her ear in a gentle punishment, and Hermione went completely still, like he'd hit her with a Petrification spell, her heart pounding a mile a minute in her chest. "Better," he murmured. "Now, what is this again about wanting us both?"

She glanced at Blaise for help, but he merely smirked and crossed his arms over his broad chest. "Yes, Hermione, do tell us more," he prompted.

"I-I've come to think… v-very highly of the two of you," she stammered. "You… mean a lot to me, and-" For the first time in her life, Hermione stumbled over her words, her nerves getting the better of her mouth. Taking a deep breath, she tried for simplicity: "I like you both very much."

"You _like_ us," Draco repeated.

She nodded. "Very much."

"Is that all you feel? I thought you said you loved us."

"It's probably not a very wise thing to admit that again," she admitted. "You're both ruthless when it comes to getting what you want, I've noticed, and after the fight the other day…" She left that thought hanging, uncomfortable reliving that horrible moment.

Behind her, Draco stiffened.

Blaise cleared his throat. "About that, _amante_… After talking to each other, and then Potter about the music box, we think the irrational anger and jealously were a result of the horcrux's influence on us."

"Because Blaise and I have absolutely no problems with each other, or with sharing a witch," Draco interjected.

"We've done it before," Blaise admitted.

"More than once," Draco confirmed.

"Although, it's true that neither of us loved Pansy or Astoria," Blaise stated. "It was all about the sex with them."

Behind her, Draco chuckled. "Pure-blood Slytherin witches are saucy, bad-tempered bitches."

Hermione was flabbergasted by the rather nonchalant way her two housemates had just admitted to her face to not only engaging in casual sex, but doing so _together_. Her mind was so overwhelmed by what that could possibly mean for the three of them that all she could latch on to was what Draco had just said.

"That rhymed."

Blaise laughed. "_Amante__,_ is that all you can say? We just admitted that we both want you as much as you want us, and that we have no issues being involved with you in any manner you wish, and you're stuck on Draco's clever witticisms."

Hermione felt her cheeks heat, and she dropped her chin with embarrassment as she shrugged. "It was snappy."

Gently, Draco turned her around to face him. He slipped a finger under her jaw and pressed so her head came up. "Granger, look at me."

She did, and felt a tingle go through her to her toes.

"Say 'yes' to the idea."

"What idea?"

"To the three of us, together."

Her belly fluttered with nerves. "I'm not sure I can. I'm not sure I'm built for such a thing. It's not a very traditional arrangement, is it, and I've never considered being in anything but a monogamous relationship with a man."

Blaise's heat curled in behind her, sandwiching her between the two men. His hands were on her hips like they'd been magnetised to that spot, while Draco's hands smoothed over her arms and shoulders, playing with her hair.

"If it makes you feel better, you could always think of it not as a _ménage a trois_, but as two monogamous relationships happening simultaneously," Blaise teased as he lowered his head and sought out the skin at her throat with his mouth.

Hermione giggled as he struck a particularly sensitive spot with his tongue. "Stop, I'm serious. It's still a form of cheating... isn't it?"

"Not if we all agree to it," Draco refuted with all seriousness, bending his head to the opposite, unoccupied side of her neck and placing a series of gentle, wet kisses over her pulse.

"Infidelity only exists, _amante__,_ if two of us were doing this with the intention of defrauding the third party," Blaise insisted between provocative nipping of her earlobe. "Since that wouldn't be the case, there really is no reason why we shouldn't do this."

His fingers slipped around her middle and under her shirt, to dance over the soft skin of her belly in a way that left Hermione's knees shaking. It was hard to catch her breath, as both men sucked, laved, and teased her with their mouths and hands, thoroughly seducing away her arguments and her inhibitions.

"W-what would the others say?" she weakly protested, noticing for the first time that her own hands were currently engaged in a firm hold of Draco's hips, pulling him even closer.

Draco shoved a hard thigh between her legs and daringly stroked against her covered pussy, while Blaise cradled her backside against his arousal and began rubbing up and down.

"Fuck the others," Draco snarled, and took her throat with his teeth, marking her in an erotic claim, even as his hands cupped her breasts and kneaded them, exciting her nipples.

A pleasure-filled gasp was wrung from her... and then Blaise's teasing hands were unsnapping her jeans and slipping inside, under the elastic of her knickers. A low, desperate moan escaped her mouth as his fingers combed through her damp curls. "Tell us to stop, _amante_," he bade, resting his forehead into the lee of her shoulder. "If you don't want this, tell us to stop right now."

This was so opposite an experience from her nightmare-slash-delusion under the horcrux's sway that Hermione was staggered by that fact. These two wonderful, sexy wizards wanted her, but they would only have her_ if she agreed__._ There would be no taking between them, only giving, she realised. No jealousy, only pleasure. No fear, only love. Voldemort's horcrux had meant to tear her apart from Draco and Blaise. Instead, it had managed to do just the opposite.

And now that she knew how they felt about her and what they wanted, Hermione had to admit that her desire to _know_ what they might achieve together was certainly aroused...

"Yes," she answered, grabbing hold of her courage and taking the plunge. "Yes, I want this. Want you both. I want to try."

The shudders of relief that rocked through both Blaise and Draco at her capitulation nearly brought tears to Hermione's eyes.

"About time," Draco sighed, and he angled for her mouth, kissing her with ravenous hunger.

Blaise's hands were guiding them all away from the hall and deeper into the room, and shutting the door behind them. "Let's make up for the earlier trouble we caused in here, shall we?"

"How, by getting into new trouble?" she quipped around Draco's greedy lips.

The dark Italian gave a sinful, velvety chuckle against the nape of her neck as he carefully pulled her hair away to kiss her there. "But, of course, love! Trouble is a Slytherin's _raison d'être_ – same as a Gryffindor's. We just go about it differently."

He guided the three of them over to the reading sofa, and with a little creative wand work (transfiguring the settee into a bed that was large and plush enough for an entire royal party to enjoy), the former music room was soon filled with the sounds of a different kind of melody – that of kissing and gentle suckling, of the slap of wet flesh meeting in communion over and over again, and with a chorus of groans and passionate cries.

And for once in her life, Hermione Granger was not afraid to allow her curiosity to get the better of her.

_**TO BE CONCLUDED...**_

* * *

**AUTHOR'S NOTES:**

**One final chapter (the Epilogue) to go and this story will be completed! **

**Drop me a review and let me know what you thought of this chapter. When I wrote it initially, it was all rowdy sex, but then I realised when I went back and read it that I wanted the three of them to have a sensual, romantic first time that was more implied (I think it tantalizes your imaginations better this way, rather than having the in-and-out bits described in graphic detail for you). What did you think, though? **

**To answer a question one reviewer asked me: only Hermione was taken into the horcrux. Blaise and Draco never touched it, remember? Therefore, they have no idea what she saw inside. Besides, if you'll recall from the last novel, horcruxes seem to tailor their nightmarish influence upon individuals either directly touching them or intending on interacting with them in a physical manner. Hermione and Ron never heard what evil was whispered in Harry's ears when he wore the locket, and the boys never knew what the locket said to Hermione, and Hermione and Harry had no idea what it insidiously whispered to Ron. The influence was specific to each of them during that time, attacking their individual emotional weaknesses. I relied upon that canon fact for this fic.**


	5. Chapter 5: Epilogue

**EPILOGUE**

"Kreacher, come to me."

The old, hobbled house-elf popped into existence before the isolated portrait in one of the bedrooms on the topmost floor at Number 12 Grimmauld Place.

"How can Kreacher serves the Master?" the diminutive servant asked with a creaky bow.

From his place hanging high up on the wall inside the small closet, the dark wizard who had once lived and slept in this particular chamber looked with an appraising eye down upon his loyal, aging servant and really noted for the first time how very old the creature appeared. The white hair sprouting from its long, drooping ears, the sagging folds of skin around his jaw, and its arthritic hands and stooped shoulders all conveyed the same message: the elf was not long from the grave.

For a moment, the man felt a bit sad at this revelation.

Well, at least death for the little servant would be final. There would be no lingering conscience filled with regrets, or the burden of self-imposed responsibility to carry around. Once Kreacher passed into the great, white fade, all of his earthly pains would instantly vanish and his soul could find its much-deserved rest.

Not so in Regulus' case. He'd been 'awake' for more than a quarter century, alone with his thoughts and his life's resentments until quite recently. The isolation had nearly driven him mad.

Being a sentient portrait sucked.

If only he could leave this blasted picture and travel about like the other portraits! Or, at the very least, if only his portrait could be moved out of this dark, dismal closet! But this was his mother's punishment for his living-self's apostasy: she'd trapped his caricature in this small picture frame, never to be able to travel to other portraits or to have his frame moved from the resting spot she'd chosen for it, and magically cursing his image never to animate around or to speak with living wizards or witches. To the rest of the world, Regulus Black's oil-painted representation of his living form appeared as one of those mundane Muggle pieces of art.

Luckily, Regulus had found a way around his bitch mother's hex a few months ago. When the idiotic redheaded wizard who had claimed Regulus' room as his temporary man-cave accidentally bumped his frame (while deciding to redecorate the room in Chudley Canons' posters and paraphernalia, including lining the closet with the revolting things), the big nobber had shattered the glass protecting Regulus' portrait. Despite knowing he wouldn't be heard, Regulus had given the arse a dressing down... and to his utmost surprise, his screaming had been heard by his family's house-elf.

Regulus had been a clever young man in life, and since his painting had been done just one month before his death, he'd had all of his former self's memories. When the steadfast, loyal Kreacher had recognised that its Master's portrait was quite sentient, and had come to his aid, Regulus had ordered the servant to give him a run-down on what had been happening in the world since he'd awoken in this strange state. That's how he'd learned about his living-self's fate, Voldemort's first 'death', the rise of The Chosen One, and the Dark Lord's resurrection and new war.

That's when Regulus had come up with 'The Plan'.

"You took the ribbon from around the box and put it where they would find it, yes?"

Regulus knew his orders would not have been disobeyed, but he also understood that the house-elf needed to be rewarded for a job well done, and that this was a way in which that goal could be accomplished without making the elderly elf feel uncomfortable.

His servant nodded. "As the Master commands Kreacher, Kreacher does as commanded."

"Excellent." He watched with satisfaction as the elf stood a little straighter at the praise. "And the others know now that the music box is a horcrux?"

The sallow-skinned creature nodded its knobby head. "Kreacher hears Master Potter confirms it. But Kreacher also hears that the Mudblood witch opened the box."

A shot of fear struck through Regulus. "The witch - was she harmed?"

"Kreacher sees the Mudblood's eyes and hands bandaged, but then the wizards heal her. Kreacher sees her just now in the music room, doing nasty, dirty, wicked things with the Master's once-removed cousin and the Zabini wizard." The elf made a sour face, as if the thought disgusted him.

Regulus was satisfied, however, with the news. The existence of the hidden horcrux had been revealed to Harry Potter, who Kreacher had told him all about, and now he was confident that the thing would be destroyed. Having failed to shatter the locket long ago, Regulus felt he had been given a second chance to make things right. As he could go nowhere else, this had been the only option available to him.

Of course, he'd known that removing Sirius' bespelled ribbon from the box would allow the horcrux within it to stir awake and begin making its mischief, as Kreacher had explained the special Sticking Charm his brother had placed on the item. However, that had been a risk Regulus had been willing to take to alert the others to the horcrux's existence.

And, frankly, it had been the only way he could influence such matters without the others in the house knowing who was responsible. After all, Regulus' end game did not include Harry Potter or his friends plaguing him for days with inane questions. Being drained for answers until he was of no further use, and then left to rot once more in the closet, forgotten and alone, was not the future Regulus wanted. He was tired, and wanted to merely correct this one thing to even out the balance sheet of his life's failures. Then, he wanted it all to end.

Finally, now, he knew he could rest in peace. His plans had come to fruition.

"Kreacher, here are my final commands to you: First, you will use Sirius' charmed ribbon to assure that the curtains around my mother's portrait downstairs in the hallway never open again. I don't care what magic you use to accomplish that goal, but know that I want her confined to stare at that black curtain all the rest of her days, as she condemned me to live in this dark closet for mine. Second, you will burn my portrait to ash and set me free after this conversation ends. I am weary and want to sleep. Just have a care not to burn the house down, too. Third, you will do whatever you can to aid Harry Potter in defeating Lord Voldemort. I give you to him. Henceforth, he will be your Master." He stared down at his little servant with a bald eye. "Do you understand everything I have commanded?"

His house-elf looked ready to cry. He bowed his tiny head and acquiesced. "As the Master commands Kreacher, Kreacher does as commanded," he repeated.

"Good," Regulus said. He took a deep breath and let it out in a final sigh. "Very good."

Moments later, as his canvas began to burn, the elf's magic catching the oils of the paint and igniting it with ease, Regulus Black sat back and smiled. Then, he laughed.

He was free, at long last. Free from his mother, free from this life... free from his regret.

His last thought before his image was completely destroyed was to hope that his former, dark Master burned, too. He hoped the bastard burned and bled until his screams became nothing more than discordant music in the air.

_**~FIN~**_

* * *

**AUTHOR'S FINAL NOTES:**

**So, now you know who the 'Threnody' was referring to in the story (re: last line). Did you expect this/like this twist?**

**No sequel planned at this time. This was a fest piece, intended as a stand-alone gift, and I think the story is at a good stopping point. I'll leave Draco-Hermione-Blaise's fate as a romantic threesome and the war's outcome to your imagination. That's much more fun, anyway, I think. :)**

**Please review! Let me know what you thoughts!**


End file.
